International Manifesto of the Paperless
The First of May is the day of the workers in most countries in the world commemorating the workers who gave their lives in order to win the 8-hour labour day. On this day everybody will hold demonstrations to support workers’ rights and the rights of the oppressed nations. It is a day of struggle, of commemoration, of pride. It is our day, regardless what country we come from, whether we were born here or in some other part of the planet, we are up against the same injustice.
In the USA, it has been those without the papers who have stood up for this date and they resumed that struggle six years ago. Today, hundreds of thousands of immigrant workers are out in the streets protesting against the racist attacks against the immigrants materialised in the HR 4437 passed by the House of the Representatives of the National Congress. On the first of May, the immigrants summon for a day “without immigrants” and an international boycott of American products demanding the regularisation of the situation of the paperless. The first of May is not a public holiday in the USA and by abstaining from any activity on that day, the immigrants wish to draw attention to their essential role in the economy of the country.
In Europe, the ones without papers are getting on the move for the same reasons. In Belgium 10 000 people walked out into the street to demand an end of the expulsions and for the regularisation of the paperless, to say NO to the closed centres and prisons for people born in the “wrong place”. Today the paperless have taken six churches and claim for the regularisation of their hunger strike.
In Spain, a last-year process of limited regularisation left hundreds of thousands of workers without any and many others seriously handicapped to renew theirs. Several months ago, thousands of paperless people crowded the streets of Madrid shouting “Native or foreign the working class is only one.”
Last October, in the Netherlands the population rose against the death of tens of paperless workers, burnt alive like rats in huge cages during a fire in Schipol. In France, thousands of young Arabs walked out into the streets to protest against discrimination and today the Paperless get together and join the struggles of the young French workers against the CPE
Papers for all and no conditions
It is the system based on the unrestricted greed for money and immoderate exploitation of the planet and most of its inhabitants what has caused the displacement of millions of workers from the poorest countries towards the rich countries in search of work and a way to feed their families.
Faced with this migratory phenomenon, the governments of the host countries create cruel laws to chain and control the immigrants. The different laws of foreignness and other of proposed “adjustment” of immigrants regulate the conditions of work, conditions of life and residence of the immigrants submitting them to a double legislation, creating second-class citizens and promoting a new kind of slavery. These are xenophobic laws (meaning: hatred of foreigners). Just as Europe intends to “export its borders” to Libya, Morocco, etc, the USA wants to drive its frontiers south of Mexico and use the Mexican administration fro stop the flow of immigrants in the south of that country. This is the struggle that is getting generalised in all the rich countries: France, USA, Belgium, England, Switzerland, etc. That is why any struggle of the immigrants in one country will be reflected in all the other countries and steps have to be taken to coordinate them.
All immigrants who are physically living in the host countries have the right to possess all the documents they need to get a decent job and to enjoy full rights and dignity. “Migratory status” is used by the governments to maintain a mass of labour reserve for whom the access to decent working conditions is banned and that in turn allows them to push down the salaries and working conditions of all the other workers.
Native or foreign, there is only one working class
The division of workers between natives and foreigners, between immigrants with papers and immigrants without papers is meant to damage and prevent our unity. It is hat allows for such laws as the New Labour Reform in Europe, which attacks and reduces our rights. The first ones to be affected by such reforms conceived to make dismissals easier are the immigrants.
That is why all the workers, with or without papers must be admitted without any discrimination into the trade unions that defend the rights of all of us.
Native or foreign, we are all workers and that means the end of the division between workers, it means unity in action against the system that benefits slavery and racism.
That is why on the First of May we shall walk out into the streets to shout: Rights, Dignity and Respect. Whether from here or from somewhere else, workers are all the same. We call on all the workers, with or without the papers, to get together and to subscribe this international declaration of the movement of the paperless.
USA: Coalición Nacional por la Dignidad y Resistencia Permanente
Belgium: Union de Sans Papiers (UDEP)
Spain: Asociación de Trabajadores Inmigrantes en España (ATRAIE)
France: Coordination Nationale des Sans Paiers (CNSP)
Italy: Comitato Immigrati in Italia
Note: the IWL-FI supports this manifesto and the summons. All political or social organisations or trade unions that wish to adhere may do so as “Supporting organisations”.
